[Advaita-l] Advaita vEdAnta - Unit (28)

[Krishnamurthy Ramakrishna]

Dear Prem,
Namaste!
I have annotated answers to respective questions; look for answer
between ***.........***
Regards,
K. Ramakrishna.


-----Original Message-----
From: advaita-l-bounces at lists.advaita-vedanta.org
[mailto:advaita-l-bounces at lists.advaita-vedanta.org] On Behalf Of prem d p
Sent: Tuesday, May 08, 2007 12:09 PM
To: A discussion group for Advaita Vedanta
Subject: Re: [Advaita-l] Advaita vEdAnta - Unit (28)

namaste...
   
  dear sri krishnamurty,
   
  in the space of a few posts the ground you have covered is breath-taking,
  taking in your stride some eternal controversies too. it lead me to do a
  lot of reflection and re-examination of my understanding of phenomena,
  existence,and non-existence.
   
  i would like your kind clarification of the following points:
   
  1. could positing abhava-rupa as different and un-supported by either maya
or
  brahman lead to compromising the absoluteness of brahman ? is it not wrong
  even to say that there IS 'nothing' besides brahman! ie. saying 'brahman
is
  everything' is not same as saying that 'there IS Nothing(ness) other than
  brahman' (?). so even if anything is cast away into a void, that void
finally
  resolves into brahman (?).

*** Void is from whose perspective? There is no spatial void - Atmanah
AkAsha sambUtah, AkAshAd-vAyuh.....; The space emanates from Atma or Brahman
Also pUrNam adah, pUrNam idam ... void (our perception) is included in the
pUrNa ***
   
  2. your exposition of the continuity between the vyashti and samashti is
  brilliant. this is how vedanta is not 'western idealism'. now the link
between 
  samashti-taijasa and the vyashti-sukshma-sarira indicates that there is a
  cosmic plane of inter-action between sukshma-sariras, in the
cosmic-taijasa-
  loka (?). could this be elaborated ?

  *** I will try to do a paper on this later when the study is completed ***

  3. as you have explained, though the deep-sleep state is prajnana-ghana,
it is
  not the state of realization of a jnani. this tells me that going inwards
is not
  same as going towards the deep-sleep state, though quiescence of
antah-karana is common to both. apparently, then there is a
satvic-quiescence vis-vis
  a tamasic quiescence (?). satva allowing the light of atma to pour, as it
were,
  through to one's sarira (?). what does adi shankara say ?

*** There is no association with one's sharIra, either in deep sleep or in
realization; we will discuss the state of realization of Brahman in about 
3-4 units later. Please hold back this thought till then. ***
   
  4. the karana-upadhi maya makes brahman 'appear' as iswara. but being
  karana it is unmanifested. the intelligent and material support that
brahman 
  provides jagat & jivas is through the agency of the Lord Iswara. Would it
be
  right to say that, in this conception of cosmos, Lord & Jiva have to
necessarily
  co-exist and cannot merge into each other without each of them merging
into
  brahman by means of dissociation with their respective upadhis ?

*** Brahman providing intelligent and material support to jagat and jIva
means (1) the jagat and jIva are different from Brahman and (2) Brahman is
a kartru - doer; Both are incorrect. Though Brahman with the upAdi of mAyA
is Iswara, Iswara is not different from Brahman, because mAyA is not
different from Brahman and is a power of Brahman. The upAdi of jIva is due
to avidyA, which is a weakness in jIva; Iswara has no need to dissociate
from upAdi in the same sense as jIva's need to dissociate from upAdis to
realize Brahman, because Iswara (with the upAdhi of mAyA) is an identifiable
form of Brahman,. A jnyAi sees God in the world; an ajnyAni sees God as
world ***
   
  5. i was unable to grasp your statement that 'unhappiness' and 'happiness'

  differ mainly in the difference in their distance (layers of covering)
from atma. i
  can see how the difference between sensual pain and pleasure is one of 
  degree, but sadness and happiness seems like perversions of the ananda by
  association with the desire-karma-vasana chain of transformation (?). ie. 
  happiness and un-happiness themselves constitute a chain (?).

*** When a jIva (human) desires an object and when he gets it, he becomes
one with it (forgets everything else) momentarily. This oneness creates the
layers of upAdi (he has created for himself)to slip temporarily, and he
displays an Ananda or happiness, which is nothing but his svarUpa (the
svarUpa comes to display). This is that expression of happiness. However,
when he does not get the desired object, his association with that object
increases (he starts thinking more about it), thus increasing the number of
layers of upAdi, and the jIva is further removed from the Atman; so the
svarUpa of Ananda is further away from the jIva. This apparent distancing of
the jIva from the svarUpa, displays as a decreasing happiness, though the
svaRupa remains the same (think of layers of insulation reducing the
temperature at the surface of the outermost layer of insulation); This
momentary experience of decreased happiness is expressed as sorrow. ****